


bless your soul (your head in the clouds)

by SafelyCapricious



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Rock Band, F/M, Friendship, Gossip, Meet-Cute, News Media, Rock Stars
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-01
Updated: 2018-01-31
Packaged: 2019-03-12 04:04:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13539324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SafelyCapricious/pseuds/SafelyCapricious
Summary: Jemma doesn't mind being famous, but she's happy being one of the lesser recognized members of the group. Unfortunately the universe, or at least someone with a camera phone, has different plans for her.A rock-band romance AU filled with rumors, misunderstandings, and mostly friendship.





	bless your soul (your head in the clouds)

**Author's Note:**

> The lovely starfishdancer prompted me: a Rockband!AU and/or Popband!AU where Grant and Jemma are in different bands with a (mostly friendly) rivalry. On and off stage flirting, paparazzi, Skye being the most Skye ever, fond Manager!Coulson, inscrutable May no matter the role (because she's awesome that way), awards shows, more GLITTER... the possibilities are endless, and I know you'd rock it out of the park, because you always do!
> 
> I'm not sure I've managed to do it justice (there is _no_ gitter yet? HOW?) but I hope you like the first part!

Jemma isn’t watching where she’s going – she’s too busy texting furiously. (If Fitz doesn’t fix this fallacy than his thesis committee will destroy him – and there is no way she’s going to sing the main stanza by herself on their new song, Skye!) So it’s not exactly a surprise to anyone, including herself, when she runs into someone.

 

Her phone and his coffee go crashing to the ground – in exactly the wrong order – and she watches in horror as Skye’s joyful “It’ll be great! I’ll arrange everything!” text message blinks and then fizzles, covered in coffee, before the screen goes dark.

 

“Oh, no.” She knows Skye, and silence on this matter will be seen as consent. “Oh no, no, no!” She desperately snatches the phone off the ground and tries to bring it back to life. The screen lights up for one blissful moment and then makes a sad dying purr and goes dark.

 

She has to get to Skye _now_ – before she makes an announcement or – “Here,” she says, pulling money out of her purse and shoving it at the man, “I’m so sorry about your coffee – I have to go – I’m so sorry!” She only gets a quick look at him before she sprints away, and she thinks he looks familiar – have they met before? – before dismissing the thought. It’s Los Angeles, it’s a big city and she sees lots of faces every day.

 

Jemma forgets about him before she’s gone two blocks.

 

***

 

“So girls,” says the extremely smiley morning show host after they’ve taken their seats on the chic and wildly uncomfortable couch, “I’m obligated to ask every time you come on the show – and thank you so much for coming on again, we do love having you – are you ready to tell us what your name means?”

 

The five of them exchange a look and then Raina, being seated closest to the woman, leans forward and stage whispers, “Well…do you really want to know?”

 

The host leans forward, hands clasped together and smile even brighter. “Of course!”

 

“Well,” continues Raina, “You can’t tell anyone but…Agents of S.O.S. stands for Sadly out of Smoothies.”

 

Jemma smothers a giggle in her hand and Skye claps a hand over her mouth after letting out a loud squawking laugh. “Oh my gosh, Raina! I love it! Why didn’t you tell me that one?”

 

The host dramatically despairs, sinking back into her seat and shaking her head as Raina and Skye engage in a playful argument over the most hilarious possibilities they’ve ever come up with, before she interrupts them. “Bobbi, we have your ex-husband on the show – That’s Lance Hunter of the Mad Mercenaries – later this week, do you think there’s any chance we can get _him_ to tell us the meaning of your name?”

 

Bobbi snorts and shakes her head, and Jemma leans forward to helpfully add, “I’m afraid he most certainly can’t – him not knowing _was_ in their wedding vows.”

 

Before the host can dog that particular bone, Elena leans forward with another tidbit they’d all agreed to share on the air today. “Besides, they’ve started dating again – even if he did know, which he _doesn’t_ – he wouldn’t want to risk the best thing he ever lost.” She winks at the camera and the audience is in an uproar.

 

As predicted the next few minutes involve the host quizzing Bobbi and Bobbi gracefully only sharing as much as she wanted to – with Skye cheerfully slipping in other details that seemed scandalous but, again, had been previously agreed upon.

 

They’d had some rough starts, learning how to navigate the media monster, but it had been years since they hadn’t come well prepared to an interview – even one as brainless as this one. Part of it was practice; part of it was their honestly terrifying PR manager, May, who made sure they were well prepared for anything.

 

“So, Jemma,” the host says after the teasing of Bobbi is done. Jemma smiles to hide her grimace.

 

Skye _had_ announced the song line up before she’d gotten to her and she’d been dreading trying to be excited about it. There was a reason she was the least seen member of their band – and it wasn’t just because she was stuck at the piano during shows.

 

“I hear you have your own romance going on – though some reports say it’s on the rocks. Anything you want to say to that?”

 

The shock only lasts for a moment, that the woman had decided to poke this dead horse instead of bringing up the song is surprising but pleasantly so, before she’s shaking her head and chuckling lightly. “Oh no, are the rumors about me and Fitz circling again? I’m afraid I’m tragically single.”

 

Someone in the audience calls out a proposal and she laughs and ignores it.

 

The host is frowning at her around her smile, and then leaning to look back at the tech people. “Pull up the – thank you!”

 

And there on the screen is Jemma. It takes a moment for her to place what’s happening, because the angle of the photo makes it look extremely intimate. He’s staring down at her, his hands raised but not touching her and she’s staring down at her dying phone – though the phone and coffee can’t be seen in the photo – and he still looks very familiar.

 

“Do you really want to tell me that there’s nothing between you and Grant Ward, the lead singer of The Splinter Bombs?” The host winks and almost leers at Jemma and Jemma – Jemma can feel the blood drain from her face.

 

“Oh, no, that’s not – “ She takes a breath and forces herself to finish more calmly. “I’m afraid we’ve never met – I ran into him, I wasn’t paying attention you see, and his coffee got on my phone and, well…” She shrugs sheepishly and smiles at the audience. “I was too distressed by the loss of my phone to really pay attention to what was going on.”

 

“So, this wasn’t a lovers spat? Because it looks quite serious.” The host clicks through a few more photos and Jemma can see the progression – her shoving something at him and him looking shocked and then her rushing off with her head down, hair hiding her face and – it looks very bad. She can practically hear May’s growl from here – even though their PR manager is waiting for them two states away.

 

“No.” Jemma says firmly. “We’ve never met. I’m afraid this is all just a big misunderstanding.”

 

***

 

“Someone who knows you ‘very well’ wrote into TMZ with the ‘details’ of your ‘love affair,’” Elena says, making copious quote marks with her hands.

 

Jemma groans and buries her face in her pillow and then, for good measure, screams into it.

 

Skye pats her back, trying to be comforting now that she’s finally done laughing about it. “Come on, Jem, it’s not so bad. At least your fake – what’re they right now?”

 

“Fiancé,” Raina, the traitor, supplies with an audible smirk.

 

“At least your fake fiancé is hella fine,” Skye continues like she thinks that will be comforting.

 

“Guys, lay off,” says Bobbi – bless her heart, “haven’t you heard? Grant is a rebound because Trip turned her down.”

 

Jemma takes it all back, she hates them all. Head still buried in her pillow she tries to hit anyone she can reach – she can hear the others giggling as they duck out of the way and ugh. She sits up and hugs the pillow to her. “I hate this.”

 

“Aw,” Skye actually has the audacity to coo at her, but then she’s settling next to her and pulling her into a hug. “I know you do, babe, but it’ll blow over. There’s no meat to it – how long can they keep beating this dead horse, huh? He backed up your story even.”

 

“He…what?”

 

“Oh, did you not see? Yeah, someone asked him about it and he gave the same story – spilled coffee and dead phone. I think it’s still up on the website, hold on,” Skye bounces off the couch to find her computer as the others take up the spots. Even Raina, notoriously hostile towards physical affection, offers her a sideways hug.

 

“It’ll die off soon enough, you know,” Bobbi says, handing her a cup of tea, “these things always do.”

 

***

 

It does not.

 

“Did you know he used to sing pop? Like….really soda-pop pop.” Skye says while Jemma is despairing of her life on the couch in their studio.

 

She doesn’t bother to respond.

 

The situation has actually gotten worse.

 

“Apparently,” Skye continues, ignoring Jemma’s pained groan, “there was this thing where his manager – who was basically his _dad –_ got charged with drug possession and apparently was using little baby Grant – I have to show you this picture, his hair cut is so stupid – to smuggle and man, rough stuff.”

 

“Skye,” Jemma says into the couch cushions, “I don’t want to talk about Grant Ward anymore, ever, please.”

 

He’s become the only thing interviewers and hosts ask Jemma about and the center of all of their appearances. Which means that _Jemma_ has become the center of all of their appearances and – she doesn’t mind being famous, she doesn’t, but she always preferred her relative obscurity outside of the group setting, and that’s completely blown to pieces now.

  
Bobbi and Lance have even had one very loud, very public fight (which resolved in very loud but also very private makeup sex) and their latest interviewer had barely spent two minutes on it!

 

She still hasn’t even seen him in person since that one, terrible, fateful collision. She’s never even properly _spoken_ to him – and yet, last she checked, five magazines had called their relationship ‘goals’. Like that even _means_ anything.

 

“And then he disappeared for a few years –“ Jemma groans, but Skye keeps talking and Jemma just gives up. “And then when he came back it was as the lead singer of the Splinter Bombs – totally different sound.”

 

“I hate you,” Jemma says into the couch cushions and Skye pats the back of her head.

 

“He’s really pretty?” Skye says and Jemma turns her head to scowl at her.

 

“Who’re we talking about?” Raina asks, sucker hanging half out of her mouth as she wanders into the room. Jemma knows better to think that this means that maybe they’ll actually start their practice session. Instead she groans, instead of bothering to answer, and drops her head back into the couch.

 

“Ah,” says Raina.

 

***

 

“I never wanted to be famous, ya’know,” Jemma slurs, lying on her back on the most comfortable carpet in the world.

 

“I know,” Fitz – darling, darling Fitz who is her only friend and – “You know you’re saying that out loud, right? The narration thing? Also, you love your band mates.”

 

“’course I do!” Jemma protests, trying and failing to hit Fitz and mostly flailing around on the floor. “I’m obligated to love them and they’re obligated to be my friends because we make beautiful music together –“ and then she dissolves into giggles.

 

“I am definitely not drunk enough for this,” Fitz mumbles into his beer and she squints at him. He’s always been more of a lightweight than her, so it makes no sense that –

 

“Oooooh, I took shots, earlier, didn’t I?” she tilts her head to better look at Fitz and he’s sighing again.

 

“Yeah, Jemma, you did. Like seven of them – but I think one of them might’ve been empty because you didn’t manage to pour it in the glass.”

 

“Schrödinger’s shots,” she nods to herself, ignoring the fact that her bestest friend in the world is face palming and trying to finish his beer without breathing.

 

“I was expecting more whining, to be honest,” Fitz says, after he’s finished the beer that was in his hand, taken a pull of the bottle of scotch she’d left on the counter, and downed more of his next bottle of beer.

 

“Wine gives me headaches if I drink too much, n’I have to drink too much to get drunk on wine,” she explains, logically, stretching her arms over her head and digging them into the carpet.

 

“What – oh, yeah.” Fitz says, finally coming off the chair he’s been sitting on to sit next to her on the floor.

 

She shamelessly curls into his lap so he’s petting her hair.

 

“You wanna talk about it?” he asks, because he’s actually the sweetest. “You’re still narrating, by the way, but I meant talk about, you know, why you’re drinking so much.” His fingers pause in their movements and she whines, high in her throat until he continues again. “Why are you drinking so much?”

 

“Cheekbones.” Her head is cushioned on his thigh, and his pants smell weirdly like chalk. He must’ve been teaching a class again.

 

“Cheekbones,” he parrots back, and she slits an eye open to see if he’s making the face she thinks he is and when she does she giggles. “Right. That follows.” He says, and takes another long pull of his beer.

 

She can hear the cars rushing by, outside his flat, and it’s nice. It’s normal. And for a moment she can pretend that it’s just three years ago and she’d not famous and she’s still figuring out if she wants to get a third PhD or start her own company –

 

“The drummer though,” Fitz says, and this time when she opens her eyes to look up at him he’s got a flush high on his cheeks that tells her the alcohol is starting to hit him. He is too a lighter weight than her.

 

“I thought Raina scared you,” Jemma says as Fitz pats her head because he’s staring dreamily off into space.

 

“What! No, not – the Splinter Bomb’s drummer.” Fitz is spluttering so bad that Jemma starts laughing and her sides ache by the time she’s done and she’s rolled off him and he’s half collapsed and making sad wheezing noises into his hands.

 

“Alphonso Mackenzie?” she asks, because she reluctantly knows the names of every member of the band that’s driven her to drink.

 

“Yeah,” Fitz agrees, voice dreamy again and Jemma grins evilly, rolling onto her stomach and resting her chin on her folded hands.

 

“Maybe you two can dance at my fake wedding, we can make you the flower girl and him the ring bear and – “

 

The pillow comes out of nowhere, and the night ends abruptly when she accidentally breaks his lamp and they have to pick their way across the suddenly dangerous carpet to collapse in his bed and fall asleep.

 

***

“Okay, Jemma,” says Skye, apropos of nothing as they all check their various devices and unwind after a set on a tv talk show, “when you marry your dreamboat I want you to know that I wholeheartedly approve.”

 

“What.” says Jemma, barely bothering to look up from the scientific article she's reading. She's not actually dating anyone and if Skye is talking about whom Jemma _thinks_ Skye is talking about, she should definitely reconsider.

 

“He got in a fight for you,” Skye pushes between Jemma and Bobbi, wedging into the couch without shame, and shoves her phone in Jemma’s face.

 

It's a video, clearly from an older camera phone that's grainy and dark, and it takes a second for Jemma to make sense of the shapes. There appear to be two groups of people and it looks like they're standing at the back of some little, badly lit stage.

 

“Those girl bands are shit though — take the Agents of S.O.S. Or, as I like to call ‘em, Agents of Sell Out Sex! It’s all synthesized sex sells and —“ someone is saying loudly from one of the groups. Raina is now leaning over her to get a better look, fierce frown on her face.

 

“Yo,” someone, and he seems familiar, though it’s hard to tell through the bad video quality, is turning from the other group to address the speaker, “don't be like that. Those ladies work hard.”

 

“Yeah,” jeers someone from the first group, “all those blowjobs must be hell on their knees!”

 

A second man from the second group turns around and it's Grant Ward — which immediately places the familiar man who spoke first as Antione Triplet.

 

“What—“ Jemma cuts herself off as Ward just hauls off and decks the second speaker and then the video becomes incomprehensible as the people blur into a mass of fighting and yelling and then it cuts off abruptly.

 

“Uh, it's viral,” says Elena from across the room, turning her own tablet around so they can see a paparazzi photo of Ward with a busted lip opposite the photo of a man with blood dripping out of his nose and the headline “Feud between The Splinter Bombs and Unmindful Compliance explodes following insults to Agents of S.O.S.”

 

“Oh bloody hell,” is all she can say when Elena scrolls down and she sees her own portrait smiling back at her from right under Ward’s.

 

***

 

She hasn’t got any death threats. Or, at least, no more than normal. There’s always someone twitting something rude and including her or one of the other girls but now…now it’s like they have their own defense squad.

 

Which is, perhaps, the only unexpected upside to all of this. In fact, from Splinter Bomb fans after the altercation she sees an outpouring of respect and good wishes to her and her band.

 

It’s not that their normal followers _aren’t_ supportive and don’t defend them – it’s just that apparently punk fans take it a bit more seriously – or maybe are just more intimidating when they want to be.

 

She has nearly twenty thousand new followers on twitter over the course of eight hours. (She's not sure many will last through her science tweets, but it's at least supportive and she can appreciate that.)

 

The guilt doesn’t come until she’s signing autographs after another appearance and one of _his_ fans is there – Splinter Bombs t-shirt being an obvious clue – and gets a photo with her and asks her to tell Grant how much he loves him.

 

“Oh, I’m not – we aren’t – together?” she stumbles over her words and can only be glad there’s not a microphone anywhere around her.

 

The man nods enthusiastically and smiles. “Yeah, labels are pretty over rated, but if you could tell him…?”

 

“Yes, yes of course,” she says, because of course she does.

 

And of course that means she actually has to contact him.

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! I hope you like it! Please let me know what you think! This is an...interesting AU for me! 
> 
> As always, if you wanna chat, prompt, or just leave me some vaguely ominous preditions, I can be found [here](http://capriciouswrites.tumblr.com/)


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